• The Centennial State Ballet will perform "The Nutcracker" from Dec. 15-17 at the Niwot High School Auditorium, 8989 Niwot Road, Niwot. Tickets available at centennialstateballet.org.

• The Colorado Ballet will perform "The Nutcracker" until Dec. 24 at the Ellie Caulkins Opera House, 1385 Curtis St., Denver. Tickets available at coloradoballet.org.

• The Moscow Ballet will perform "The Great Russian Nutcracker," Dec. 8 and 9 at the Paramount Theater, 1621 Glenarm Place, Denver. Tickets available at paramount.theatredenver.com.

"The Nutcracker" was not an immediate hit in the United States.

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Despite its current status as a cultural staple of the holiday season, the iconic ballet by Russian composer Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky remained largely unheralded in the West for decades after its debut in Saint Petersburg in 1892. It was only in the 1960s, during the height of Cold War tensions with the Soviet Union, that this piece of music by one of Russia's most beloved artists turned into an honored and hallowed annual Christmas tradition in America.

"It was, relatively speaking, quite a long time before it made its way to the U.S.," said Elliot Moore, music director of the Longmont Symphony Orchestra. "In the West, it has become a real Christmas tradition. I sometimes wonder why."

Moore's inaugural season as the creative leader of the LSO has offered the young conductor an in-depth opportunity to explore the phenomenon firsthand. The LSO's two collaborative performances of "The Nutcracker" with the Boulder Ballet slated for Dec. 2 and 3 at the Vance Brand Auditorium are part of a season dubbed "New Frontiers." The lineup features plenty of beloved standards from the classical music catalogue — works like Rimsky-Korsakov's "Scheherazade" and Beethoven's Symphony No. 1 figure in the lineup.

The sheer number of "Nutcracker" performances hardly dims the importance of the upcoming collaborative shows for the Longmont Symphony. Just as runs of "A Christmas Carol" draw otherwise untapped theater audiences for troupes across the state, Tchaikovsky's ballet is a reliable way to draw audiences that may not otherwise be drawn to the world of classical music. For many, the show is the official gateway to the holiday season, a soundtrack that kicks off the Christmas spirit.

The crew at the Longmont Symphony are well aware of the music's significance, all the way down to the community level.

"It brings a lot of people, a lot of community members to hear the orchestra. For some, it's their only experience hearing the Longmont Symphony," said Kay Lloyd, the symphony's executive director. "It starts the holiday off for a lot of people — it's the first thing they do. We have a lot of young families, grandmas and grandpas bringing young kids. I think it captures the imagination of a lot of audience members."

The score comes alive on stage

But what is it about the piece that's turned it into such a reliable symbol of the holidays? Moore, who will conduct the work for the first time, has worked hard to answer that question. Apart from the fanciful plotline and a colorful cast of characters that includes dancing dolls, mice, angels and sugar plum fairies, the work boasts signature musical touches, elements echoed in Tchaikovsky's other ballets and symphonies.

"Everything that I'm studying in this score, I see in his symphonies," Moore said. "It's how he writes for the horn. With some of the little cells that he uses, specifically his triplets, he uses the horns for driving music forward. The violin music is very similar. That's what I'm finding fascinating."

Working with the Boulder Ballet has given Moore a chance to see these musical touches in a different light. In attending dance rehearsals, the conductor has seen the score come alive in a different way — Tchaikovsky's rhythms, melodies and larger music concepts have found a novel expression, a fusion between sound and movement that Moore calls "magical."

That effect has come largely in the precision of the choreography. The Boulder Ballet performed "The Nutcracker" at Mackey Auditorium on the Univeristy of Coloardo campus earlier this month, and they're bringing the same well-honed, expertly plotted dance plan to the stage at Vance Brand Auditorium.

"When the music goes down, the dancers go up. That feeling is very translatable to his symphonies. Often, there is a feeling of lightness on the down beats," Moore said. "When the beat is down, that is when the lifts happen, that's when the dancers take flight."

This type of in-depth analysis is part of Moore's larger vision for the Longmont Symphony. Though the 2017-18 season features a number of musical warhorses, Moore is committed to presenting them in a new way, and "The Nutcracker" is no exception. Audiences have a wide array of performances to choose from, but Moore wants to offer a unique spin on the holiday staple.

That means exploring its details and searching for the composer's artistic intent; it means drilling down to the meaning of the piece, and trying to get a hold on the reason for its popularity and longevity.

For Moore, the answers to those elusive questions lie in the spirit of the holiday.

"It's looking at old music in new ways ... (and) one of the things that has really struck me about the piece is magic, and maybe how that relates to the season," he said. "Getting an opportunity to get a fresh look at 'The Nutcracker' is just amazing."

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